A major result on the future of the 11-year sunspot cycle will be announced at a news briefing on Tuesday, 14 June 2011, at 11 a.m. MDT (17:00 UTC) by scientists at the 2011 meeting of the Solar Physics Division (SPD) of the American Astronomical Society (AAS) in Las Cruces, New Mexico. Media are invited to attend the briefing in person or via media telecon.
AAS/SPD is holding its triennial standalone meeting 12-16 June 2011, hosted by New Mexico State University, at the Las Cruces convention center. AAS/SPD offers complimentary press registration to bona fide working journalists and public-information officers. For press registration, please contact the SPD press officer, Dr. Craig DeForest, with the subject line “SPD: PRESS REGISTRATION” as soon as possible.
For access to the media telecon, journalists should contact Dr. Craig DeForest, AAS/SPD press officer, by email at deforest@boulder.swri.edu with the subject line “SPD: SOLAR MEDIA TELECON”. You will receive a confirmation email. Access instructions will be emailed out at 10 a.m. MDT (16:00 UTC) on Tuesday, 14 June.
Additional scientific highlights of the AAS/SPD meeting include prize and invited lectures on topics ranging from the solar cycle (Hale Prize lecture by Dr. Hendrik Spruit), through the connection between the solar interior and corona (Parker lecture by Dr. William Abbett), to the solar-stellar connection (Parker lecture by Dr. Marc Pinsonneault). Important topics include solar prominences (Parker lecture by Dr. Judy Karpen), suborbital manned experimentation for solar physics (special lecture by Dr. Alan Stern), an overview of spectacular new results from NASA’s Solar Dynamics Observatory (invited talk by Dr. Dean Pesnell), and a special session on new results from the large solar telescope recently commissioned at the Big Bear Solar Observatory.
More information on the meeting:
* Main meeting website: http://astronomy.nmsu.edu/SPD2011
* Conference schedule: http://astronomy.nmsu.edu/SPD2011/schedule.html
